New Bug Prompts Earlier End to Google+ Social Network

Google said Monday it will close the consumer version of its online social network sooner than originally planned due to the discovery of a new software bug.

The Google+ social network will close in April -- four months earlier than planned -- and the internet giant will focus on operating a version tailored for businesses, according to G Suite product management vice president David Thacker.

Application programming interface programs (APIs) used by developers to access Google+ data will be shut down within 90 days, according to Thacker.

"With the discovery of this new bug, we have decided to expedite the shut-down of all Google+ APIs," Thacker said in a blog post.

"While we recognize there are implications for developers, we want to ensure the protection of our users."

A new bug introduced via a software update in November was discovered during routine testing and fixed, according to the company.

Google determined that the vulnerability affected approximately 52.5 million users, allowing applications to see profile information such as name, occupation, age and email address even if access was set to private.

"No third party compromised our systems, and we have no evidence that the app developers that inadvertently had this access for six days were aware of it or misused it in any way," Thacker said.

In October, Google announced plans to shut down the social network after fixing a bug exposing private data in as many as 500,000 accounts.